Ospreys beat Leicester 17-12 yesterday to advance into the quarter finals of the Heineken Cup as one of the two best group runners-up. The result is being disputed by the Tigers though, as the Ospreys fielded a 16th man during the game.

The Welsh region reached the last eight for the third year in a row as they knocked out two-time champions Leicester at the Liberty Stadium in Swansea.

Leicester however are hoping for a lifeline after Ospreys appeared to have 16 players on the field for over a minute. Theyve made an official complaint after Lee Byrne played a role in stopping a Tigers attack.

He had gone off with a bloodied and dislocated toe, being replaced by Sonny Parker. When he came back three minutes later though, no Ospreys player left the field for over a minute.

"This was a very serious incident with a 16th player interfering with a try-scoring event at a crucial part of the game, said Tigers chief executive Peter Wheeler.

"We have lodged a complaint with ERC because at a significant point of the game the Ospreys had 16 men on the pitch, and that 16th man interfered with, or was involved in, a break by Ben Youngs and played a significant role in nothing developing from that.

"If you play a player who is unregistered, you get docked points and strung up and all sorts of bad things happen."

Referee Alan Lewis, who should have awarded a penalty at the time, was apparently told by an Ospreys player that Leicester also had 16 players on the pitch, an accusation that the Tigers strongly deny.

Leicester insists that the punishment should be severe, considering the outcome of the result. The Ospreys however are hoping that theyll get away with just a fine, and continue in the tournament, facing Biarritz in the quarter final in April.

"It was very passionate and a lot of things were said down there," said Ospreys coach Scott Johnson. "But its a matter for the officials to sort out. I want to concentrate on the footie."

This latest bit of controversy has been dubbed Subgate, following on from Bloodgate and Mudgate. Well update the article when we know the results of the appeal.
Do you think the Ospreys should be fined, have points deducted, or neither, with this simply being an unfortunate mistake by the officials? Let's hear your thoughts on the matter.

Time:
05:00
Note:
Better highlights will be posted later in the week if possible

Viewing 69 comments

Why didnt the clip show the osps destroying the Leicester scrum in the 60th min? It was the turning point of the game! We deserved the win though, Byrne was only on for 30 seconds, and didnt touch the ball! Word is, that the Osps are getting ready to launch a complaint of their own, with a testimony from one of the touch judges, that proves Leicester also had 16 on the pitch at one point! With the 'hand of back' and Corry's gouging last year, Tigers cant claim to be squeaky clean at all! They are the biggest cheaters of around!

Most of the Leicester fans acknowledge that the better team won. Just that we all feel gutted this happened when we could have come back.
Not that we are bitter, just want to see this will work out eventually.

To the annoy above me: if u think we are the dirtiest all round, how about the times when the ball was knocked on deliberately by Os?
Also, a visit to our forum will change your perception about the Tigers and the fans.

A report in the Irish Times today 25 Jan 2010 says that Ospreys are of the view that Leicester also had 16 on at one point but opt not to make a formal complaint as they have been advised this would lead to a fine only.

The Laws of the Game cover this situation by the way :-

Law 3.1 - Each team must have no more than fifteen players on the playing area during play.

3.2 At any time before or duringa match a team may make an objection to the referee about the number of players in their opponents' team. As soon as the referee knows that a team has too many players the referee must order the captain of that team to reduce the number appropriately. The score at the time of the objection remains unaltered, Sanction : Penalty at the place where the game would restart.

Also possibly relevant.

3.11 (a) - (c) summary a player wishing to return who joins the match without referee's permission, where the referee believes the player did so to help that player's team or obstruct the opposing team the referee penalises at the place where play would restart.

So a bit wierdly its left to the other team to object. Few would argue that the ref is not obliged to step in however on noticing a problem absent any objection.

No provision in the laws is made for reversing a game's outcome and it seems clear that where too many players are on and a try is scored and awarded the score is unaltered if objection is made after the score.

The only thing Alan Lewis did not do which seems mandated is restart with a penalty to leicester at the place where the game was to restart when he noticed the problem.

I presume Rodrigo has an inside track on the tournament rules in saying that a points sanction must be applied.

ps more substantively I did think Ospreys were the better team on the day and deserved to go through, notwithstanding that hard luck to Leicester, a class club side who will be in the knock outs of the Heineken many times to come.

Great game, gutted that it will always be tainted by this. From what ive read it seems that only the Leicester "Pen Pushers" seem to want to take this further as the coach, players, fans seem to understand it was a mistake. There seems to be several stories going around as to what happened, i believe it came down to the confused 4th official.

rodrigo, what, that would mean leicester get 6points from a match, use you head.
england did the same in 2003 world cup against samoa, result stood 10,000 fine.
Ospreys should have won convcingly, leicester almost snuck in at the end, penalty count was so high against ospreys.

There should be a sanction. Totally unacceptable to have 16 players on the field.

However, would be a shame if the sanction changed the "outcome" of the game or the pool, because the end result was probably the correct one.

But the Ospreys have no excuses. I don't know what options the ERC has, but I feel they need to take a firm line because who knows what liberties the teams will take if they think they can get away with it.

PS anyone else catch the assistance ref referring to Lote Tukiri as 'the guy from leicester with the long hair' and Will Greenwood (I think)'s comment to the effect that 'he's only got 75 caps for Australia and is one of the most distinctive looking players in world rugby' lol.

i'm an asm's fan so please excuse my english.
I was very exciting about this game but once again the tigers have only play offensively during the last 20 mins,exept Youngs who try to break the ospreys line. But Castrogiovanni to win the scrum and Mauger to score try was not enough to defeat ospreys.
if it's a strategy used for outsides games, it didn't work at Marcel-Michelin, so why retry at the liberty? Lack of confidence, players too old, old english prop as coach...yes i know it's a bad joke, Cockerill is very good.
Now i'm happy because clermont has been the victim of "the death's group" the three last years, and because it's not a french team who was caught with 16 players on the field otherwise we heard about it on the moon...
Sorry for you Tigers fans, good luck to Osprey's one.

I don't think you can really punish the Ospreys. It's the responsibility of the officials to monitor blood subs/changes/whatever. Look how strict the refereeing in American Football is. And if the refs miss something that huge it's not the players fault, it's the fault of the refs.

i think the ospreys will get a fine, but the result will stand, with out the 16th man the result could have been different he did make a tackle on youngs when he made a break, and if a penalty had been awarded then again could have been different, but the result should stand, but tigers will no doubt seek revenge next year,

It was a shame to see the 16 man incident even though it clearly didn't make the slightest difference to what was happening. Richard Cockerill was very blunt about how much of a non event it was when it comes to the result.

There's nothing in the laws to cover a rematch or the removing of points but the referee certainly needs to brush up on what he should be doing cases like this.

After the Tiger's "honestly, he was only a blood substitution" last year against the Cardiff Blues and the now infamous hand of Back cheating a few years ago against Munster in the final there really doesn't seem to be many people in the rugby world who genuinely care about Peter Wheeler's tantrum.

Not sure how some on you are saying he didnt play any part in the 50 seconds he was on the pitch as he made a tackle on ben youngs. If youngs had got through it would of been a try!

I think they should come down heavy on the ospreys to try and stamp this sort of thing out. It never seems to happen in the footy. I think leicester have done the right thing to complain, at least it highlights the problem and forces them to look at it.

Saying all that i do hope the result stands.

Also with reference to the England v Samoa. The 16th man didnt have anything to do with play, no tackles, pass's etc. Where in this case he was involed in play. So it is a little different and it did change the result of the game.

I don't mean to sound prejudiced here, but I couldn't really understand how that 16th man thing could have happened, but when I watched that youtube link above, on seeing that the one at fault was a woman, I actually wasn't surprised any more.

And I think Ieuan Evans on sky sports is insane in the membrane to say that Ospreys will win the Cup this year. Even if they do have Tommy Bowe.

hey guys i didnt watch the game and so i cant comment on the play, and i dont have time right now to watch the video.

the point that hit me the most was: 'Theyve made an official complaint after Lee Byrne played a role in stopping a Tigers attack.'

now if lee byrne was supposed to be off the pitch receiving treatment or Parker should have been off at this time then i think something has to be done.

im neither a leicester nor an ospreys fan.

most of you feel that ospreys deserved the win, there is also a statement about leicesters foul play in the past...both in my opinion are irrelevant, the score was 17-12 it is too close to right off, as for foul play in the past, also irrelevant, im not sure the stance leicester are taking (i.e whether they are labelling it as an unfair accident, or whether it was deliberate cheating.)

i think a rematch would be the most fair option, but i cant see it happening.....

No. 7 is the only post that makes any sense! The only other times i have seen this happen is in the NRL (twice) one time the player got involved and I beleive they had the competition points deducted after they won but the opposition didn't get them either. The other occasion the player didn't get involved and the club received a fine.

In AFL and soccer you can't come on without the other player coming off and an official is there especially to watch it (since above incidents also in NRL). In AFL you even have to go off at a certain place on the feild.

Why can't we do something similar?? Is the touchie (assistant ref) meant to cover this? In big games it seems to much for them alone... How come i have only ever heard of this at the professional level??

The coaches and managers at the levels I have played would never have let this happen

Ospreys were all over Leicester all day, if Biggar had his kicking boots on the result would have been far greater. The Tigers fans need to get a grip and accept their defeat graciously, especially considering they deliberately cheat all the time.

If there were 16 players and it was for more than just a few moments (ie it had some effect on the match, no matter how small in the scheme of things) than the Ospreys should lose the points.
It's gotta be that way, you simply can't break the rules like that.

'Oh, so it's ok in the distant past but not the recent past? I missed that rule.

At what point does the Ospreys situation become irrelevant? Three months, six months?'

I was referring to previous games moron!

nothing in leicester or ospreys past has anything to do with anything in this game! hence its irrelevant, is that ok for you or do you want me to write it out in phonetics so you can understand better!

i mean, you can go back and say, oh wait leicester had that martin johnson chap who was a bit rough and tough in the game.......see what i mean, it makes no difference to this game!

Has there been much in the way of sour grapes from Tigers fans? And this is the first case i can remember of Tigers actually lodging a complaint, they've always tended to leave it to the ref or comp organisers to deal with issues (Henson's elbow which broke Alex Morino's cheek/ Ian Goughs donkey kick which sparked off Ellis' knee ligament problems spring to mind for some reason)

Most of the posts from Tigers fans here seem to say that Ospreys deserve the win. They did.

Its a bit of farce that there could be a mix up like this in a game that was on a knife edge still and where the 16th man was actively involved (being either Byrne in defending Youngs break or Parker being the extra man on the wing in the following counter attack)

Ospreys shouldn't have points deducted, but someone should surely get a slap on the wrists for it.

a trademark english tantrum. lol. Didn't know tantrums were different in parts of the world.

I think he means cockerill moaning about the ospreys complaining about eye gouging. I don't think anything came of it in the end despite the "video evidence"

at the time, the ospreys had said there team had been on the receiving end of eye gouging for the last couple of games. If this was the case, i'm pretty upset they didnt complain earlier. They have a duty to look after there players and improve the game.

Valid poin t. If the points get taken off the Ospreys, than the English national team should have been stripped of points in the 2003 WC vs Samoa.
Both the exact same infringement.
I think both the Ospreys and Ebngland should have had their points stripped.
You cannot have 16 players on the field, for any reason, ever. It's a massive breech of the rules, and it does affect play.

"2003 was a little different. The english player wasn't involved in the 30 seconds he was on. Byrne was involved in the 70 odd seconds he was on.

But of course you'll fail to see that."

Ohhhhh I see your point, it's ok to bring on extra players but only with your strict criteria? Feel free to point out any other additional cheating that is ok, Corry eye gouging, Neil Back's hands going places etc.

With the Luger incident in 2003 you could argue that his prescence freed up another player to spread out to another position.

Btw it's ok to murder people called John on a Tuesday as long as it's after 1pm and your grandma isn't present (and ofc you're English).

Umm... In 2003 Dan Luger tackled a Samoan player on the attack, so he actually did MORE in his 30 seconds, than Byrne, who didnt touch anyone, in his 65 seconds! Sounds like double standards, if you want the Osps docked points, then you should want England docked points! Even if we were docked points, why should Leicester get them added on? They didnt deserve to win, and didnt look like scoring a try at all, if we did lose points, another, higher placed team should go through to the quarters, like the Blues, or London Irish!

""2003 was a little different. The english player wasn't involved in the 30 seconds he was on. Byrne was involved in the 70 odd seconds he was on.

But of course you'll fail to see that."

Ohhhhh I see your point, it's ok to bring on extra players but only with your strict criteria? Feel free to point out any other additional cheating that is ok, Corry eye gouging, Neil Back's hands going places etc.

With the Luger incident in 2003 you could argue that his prescence freed up another player to spread out to another position.

Btw it's ok to murder people called John on a Tuesday as long as it's after 1pm and your grandma isn't present (and ofc you're English)."

There are some really daft comments here and this whole incident is a joke. Yes the Os were wrong, but unless it was deliberate then it should be ignored as:
1 - the referee saw it during the game. His call and he did nothing so why overturn the result? Do we overturn any other games for blatant cheating or bad foul play that changes games?
2 - Byrne came on from the sideline next to the linesman. Therefore the linesman must have seen and you cannot blame Byrne. Technically he isn't the extra player, it would be Biggar or Parker on the other side of the field to Youngs break.
3 - Byrne didn't touch the ball or anyone. If he wasnt on the pitch then Hook would have been at FB and youngs would still have kicked.
4 - If Youngs didnt kick then Collins and Williams were about to tackle him into touch
5 - Do you honestly believe that in 79 mins of not being able to score a try, in the one min of 16 people Leic would def have scored from the half way line? No question?
6 - if you watch it, Leicester had the ball for c30 secs of the minute in question. In that time they knocked on from the kick and threw the ball out to touch while attacking - really convincing stuff!!!
7 - the laws of the game are clear. They dont say replay the game. They say - at worst - a penalty. The ref should have given a penalty but he didnt as he was crap all day. There were way more penalties he should have given against both sides and he spoiled the game by blowing up when he did.
If they prove it was a deliberate act by the team mgt then they should be fined and possibly docked points.
The ERC should sort it quick as there is little time for a replay and people want to book travel for the qtrs.
Leicester should shut up about it now. Ok for them to complain but the continued comments and law firms etc are just to put pressure to get their own way. Childish and nothing to do with making the game better for other teams.....please.

Neil Back etc etc etc......yes it happened, he cheated, he regrets it, he says so himself.......now as it is so painfully obvious i will point it out again....it was A DIFFERENT GAME!!!!

I MEAN, FUCK, BAKKIES DISLOCATED ADAM JONES SHOULDER IN THE LIONS TOUR (very appropriate as jones is welsh) ......you see what i mean, they have a partial relationship and that is it, jones is welsh, it ends there......it has no bearing on THIS F*CKING GAME!!!!

honestly if you want to go talk about that stuff type it in on the search bar (top left of the screen on the RD homepage bit) and then comment on Neil Back cheating!)

yes all sorts should have happened etc etc and ill be the first to say that but really can everyone just sort it out with THIS GAME, THIS VIDEO!

its tiresome with 90% of you so blind with jealousy, rage, revenge or whatever overlooking what happend...

honestly RD i think you'll have to put more effort in and recreate these videos with stick men drawings and called one team A and the other team B and then maybe you'll get some sensible answers.........although saying that, from this bunch of tools no doubt some prick will start of something....somehow....

What a load of noise about nothing, an honest mistake. It's happened in football numerous times and football has been a professional sport for a hell of a lot longer than rugby.

Tigers were outplayed for the entire game, the way the Ospreys smashed Leicester's scrum in the 62nd minute, it looked like they had 5 extra players in there with them. Castrogiovanni looked humiliated.

well to the 2 anonymous comments below me, i couldnt give a f*ck about englands efforts in the HEC and to the other guy, i cant say i even watched that match....what i would like to say is that if it was a close match then sure a replay is in order, otherwise take off points!

No7 I agree with you all previous examples of cheating are irrelevant. Having said that you are crazy to think the game should be replayed. Are you honestly saying that in future every time there is a close game in every professional sport and someone does something wrong - even if it is proved to be accidental - just in case it might have affected the result the game needs to be replayed? Seriously? You would never complete any tournament ever.... It was seen and dealt with by ref (badly maybe then he was crap all day) so unless someone proves it was a deliberate attempt at cheating by the Os then that is that. If deliberate cheating then should be points deduction.

Actually anonymous i have to agree, i didnt really think of the big picture, i suppose because this happened towards the end of the game it seems like a bigger issue, but i suppose there have hands in rucks which have affected the outcomes of games which also havent been picked up....so yes you're right!

To everyone i wasnt mad about this game, what got me mad was the comments like 'well leicester cheat in other games' etc etc (it got me mad cos its irrelevant!)

Sense has prevailed anyway. No reply. Fine and a ban for Byrne. 2 match ban is really harsh though...Linesman equally at fault as he could have stopped it and i bet he gets off scot free.
come on biarritz

Sorry that last comment should have said "no replay" not no reply.
Not sure what the rules are on appealing and when appeals are heard, but if he can he should appeal so he is released for the Eng game - even if he gets a week longer in the end.....

banning bryne is ridiculous... how is it his fault - he made the signal for a player to come off, he went on as told. the ref, his assistants and the ospreys staff who sent him on should have realsied and are more at fault